


Forget Our Memories

by EnbyStiles



Series: Here's to Hating High School Together [6]
Category: Fear the Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Blackouts, Drugs, Drugs are Bad, Head Injury, Heavy Angst, M/M, Misunderstandings, Neither is Nick, Non-Consensual Drug Use, Panic Attacks, Past Abuse, Past Child Abuse, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Stress Reactions, The Author Regrets Everything, The Author Regrets Nothing, Triggers, Troy is not okay, Wakes & Funerals, because it's not real consent if you're fucked up
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-03
Updated: 2020-05-03
Packaged: 2021-03-01 22:13:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,592
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23974330
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EnbyStiles/pseuds/EnbyStiles
Summary: When he comes back to himself he’s sitting curled in on himself under a tree behind the church, Jake in front of him, talking softly and holding his hands out in front of him like he’s afraid to touch Troy but wants to show he’s not a threat.“C’mon, Troy, talk to me. Snap out of it,” his older brother says in a voice he used to use when talking to Troy after he’d been locked in the basement for a long time. “Hey, you hear me?”Troy can’t find his voice, his body too locked down to make a sound yet, so he nods and blinks a few times. He hasn’t had an episode like this in a long while, but he knows it’s bad when Jake talks to him like that.
Relationships: Nick Clark/Troy Otto
Series: Here's to Hating High School Together [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1371910
Comments: 6
Kudos: 29





	Forget Our Memories

**Author's Note:**

> I apologize in advance for this.
> 
> Songs for this fic are Don't Stay by Linkin Park and Angel of Small Death and The Codeine Scene by Hozier

~Nick’s Day~

Nick hates funerals. He’s been to enough of them for one lifetime. More than enough. His grandparents. His only aunt. His dad. He honest to god told himself he would never go to another one as long as he lived. But he can’t let Troy go through this alone. It’s hard enough for the guy, he shouldn’t have to go through this alone.

And right now he is alone.

Jake is supposed to be there, but he got held up at the office dealing with papers relating to Tracy’s estate that couldn’t be left to wait, and he won’t make it out of there until the service has begun. He actually texted Nick to let him know so he could make sure Troy was alright.

The church is about an hour's drive northeast from where they live, and Nick is honestly wishing he had been able to leave with Troy that morning instead of going to that stupid check-in appointment with his rehab sponsor. He’s fine. He has Troy to help him stay grounded.

His mom’s car is old as dirt, but it has somewhat functional AC and a cd player so it makes the drive bearable. It’s hot as hell out despite the time of year, and he loosens his tie before turning up the cold air and popping in a cd he made when he was bored one night.

He zones out to the crooning of Brendon Urie, Tim McIlrath, and Hozier as he drives along the highway. It’s a Thursday, his mom giving him the day off school for his appointment and to go support Troy. The highway is fairly empty thanks to the lunchtime rush having just cleared out and it’s too early for the afternoon shift changes at most businesses.

He hasn’t gotten a chance to do something like this in a while. Just drive and sing and let himself breathe. He gets to, in a way, when he’s in the abandoned house a few blocks from home. And the few times he’s gone off on drives with Troy in his truck. But there’s something freeing about driving down the highway alone with only the voices of the radio carrying on with his own.

He’s a little late by the time he gets to the church, but he spots Troy sitting on the curb in the far back of the parking lot while looking for a space, so he figures he’s still early enough not to have missed anything important or for Troy to have been here alone too long.

The other boy looks a bit dazed, knees bent out in front of him and arms out so they rest on his kneecaps. He’s got a faraway look in his eye that Nick’s never seen before. It makes him worried as soon as he sees it.

“Hey, sorry I’m late,” Nick calls as he makes his way over to his boyfriend. He gets a blank stare in return that doesn’t actually focus on any part of him. Kind of like Troy is looking right through him. Not sure what to do, Nick reaches down and puts a hand on Troy’s shoulder, giving it a squeeze as he asks “Hey, everything alright? What’s the matter Troy?”

Something shifts in Troy’s expression and before Nick can say anything else his arm’s been twisted and he’s slamming onto his back on the pavement. His head connecting with the curb painfully and the wind gets knocked out of him in the process. For a moment all he can do is gasp for breath and try to process what just happened as the world spins.

“Don’t fucking touch me!” Troy shouts, body tense and shaking as he backs away from Nick’s prone form with that distant look still in his eyes. “Don’t fucking touch me ever again!”

Before Nick can process the words or even try to move Troy is gone. Leaving Nick to lay on the hot concrete with a pounding head and aching ribs and lungs.

He gets back into his mom’s car once he’s able to move, hands shaking as they reach to grip the wheel. He isn’t sure what just happened. One minute he was talking to Troy and the next he was on the ground with Troy screaming at him to never touch him again. It… Doesn’t quite make sense or register to him what all this could have really been or how hurt he actually is in the moment.

He moves on autopilot from there on out. 

He doesn’t remember driving back to El Sereno. Or talking to Calvin or Gloria. But when he finally starts to come back to himself he’s with them. Glo holding an ice pack on the side of his head while Cal says something about he probably shouldn’t get high when he’s hurt like this. But that he’s got something that’ll help with his head and make everything better for a while.

That sounds good. His head feels like it’s underwater. All he feels is disorienting pressure and pain. He finds himself nodding along and only hearing clips and bits of their conversation. Something about his mom and too far and his wearing a suit. He barely registers any of it. Even when he feels his jacket and tie being removed. Nothing really registers to him at all

Until he feels a prick in his arm and for a brief moment everything that’s happened comes to him in a flash. The encounter with Troy in the parking lot. Troy losing it on him. Driving in the general direction of home until he spotted Cal’s car outside one of their old hangouts. Stumbling inside to find Glo getting ready to shoot up and nod off while Cal keeps an eye on her. Everything comes to him all at once and before he can say or do anything he’s being moved onto his side and Glo is whispering in his ear that it’s okay and she’s with him, then everything fades out.

~Troy’s day~

The church is already half full by the time he gets inside, members of the ranch all showing up to say goodbye along with a few elderly distant relatives he’s never met. It’s overwhelming to say the least. He feels like his skin is too tight and his ears are ringing. 

He went over this with his therapist every day for the past week. He knows how to breathe to calm himself down. How to tense and relax his muscles to release tension. What he doesn’t know is how to deal with the fact that at the front of the church by his mother’s casket are three prison guards and his father. His father, who is supposed to be in a prison three hours away in San Diego.

It’s like all the air is sucked out of the room in an instant. Phantom aches and sharp pains overtaking him as his mind is flooded with memories of being beaten and locked in a dark, hot, basement. 

Just when he thinks he’s about to pass out his father looks at him and smiles. That same smile he would get whenever he knew he was going to get his way about something. The smile he would get when he knew Troy had given in and would do whatever he was told.

A man in a suit with an earpiece appears in front of him and starts talking about how Troy has to stick to one side of the church so as not to have any interactions with his father. It doesn’t really register and when the man asks if he understands Troy finds himself nodding on autopilot and turning to walk away.

All he can see is that smile. Burned into his mind’s eye and blocking out every other sight. All he can hear is his father telling him he’s worthless and he’ll never be a real man if he doesn’t start acting like one. And his mother screaming at him for angering his father again and that everything is always his fault. 

He stumbles out into the parking lot, legs carrying him to a few feet from his truck before he finds he can’t walk anymore and he drops to the ground. He faintly registers the sting of concrete scraping his palms as he catches himself and stumbles to a stop so that he’s sitting on the edge of the sidewalk that encircles the parking lot.

The ringing he’d been hearing before is getting louder, almost drowning out the sound of his father yelling at him to stop crying and do what he’s told. To lock down his shit and focus on his training to run the slowing growing militia on the ranch. It’s almost loud enough to even drown out the sound of his own ragged gasps for breath and pounding heartbeat.

Eventually, the ringing gets so loud it’s all he hears. He loses all awareness of his surroundings after that.

...

When he comes back to himself he’s sitting curled in on himself under a tree behind the church, Jake in front of him, talking softly and holding his hands out in front of him like he’s afraid to touch Troy but wants to show he’s not a threat.

“C’mon, Troy, talk to me. Snap out of it,” his older brother says in a voice he used to use when talking to Troy after he’d been locked in the basement for a long time. “Hey, you hear me?”

Troy can’t find his voice, his body too locked down to make a sound yet, so he nods and blinks a few times. He hasn’t had an episode like this in a long while, but he knows it’s bad when Jake talks to him like that.

“Good, just focus on the sound of my voice, okay? You’re out back of the church right now. Mom’s funeral ended about twenty minutes ago. I’ve been out here talking to you for close to an hour,” Jake says as he takes a seat on the grass in front of Troy as he explains what’s going on. “I tried to call you and Nick when I realized neither of you were in the church. Nick didn’t answer but I could hear your phone ringing and followed the sound out here,”

The mention of Nick is what clicks something in Troy’s brain back into place and he finds his voice then. “Where’s Nick?” he croaks out.

Jake's face morphs into a look of worry as he shakes his head. “I don’t know. He didn’t answer and the last I knew he was on his way here. Nobody inside saw him, or even you since before the service started.”

“Dad…” Troy manages to force the word out, the taste and sting of bile rising in the back of his throat along with it.

Jake looks pale at that. “Did he say something to you?”

Shaking his head, Troy takes a deep breath and forces himself to slowly start to uncoil and stretch out. His muscles ache from it, and he wonders how long he’s been like this. He vaguely remembers sitting on pavement… So how did he end up over here?

“He wasn’t supposed to be here, Troy. I am so sorry, little brother. I never would have let you come here alone if I had known he would be here. I wouldn’t have let them bring him in the church!” Jake swears as he holds out his hands and helps Troy up onto shaky legs.

Troy finds himself gripping Jake's hands tight, even after he’s on his feet. He feels… wrong. Off. He doesn’t understand why Nick isn’t there. He… “Shit…”

“What is it?” Jake asks. He had started to lead them over to his truck, but stops when Troy freezes mid-step.

“What if…” he begins, having to stop and swallow a few times to get his throat to cooperate. “What if I hurt Nick?” he manages to force out. He feels like he’s wearing lead. His body is heavy and his throat feels closed off. He knows he’s lashed out when he’s blacked out before. It’s how his arm got broken the last time. He snapped and took a swing at his father, or at least that’s what his mother told him. He was thrown down the stairs to the basement for his stupidity.

The look Jake gives him is meant to be reassuring, but it falls flat. “I think if that was the case we would know. Let’s just get in my truck and head home. We can call Madison and try calling Nick again. Maybe he got a flat somewhere and his phone died?” Jake tries his best to reason. 

It doesn’t really make Troy feel better, but he feels too off-kilter to argue. He just wants to get out of there and find Nick… “But moms…” Troy finds himself growing anxious at the realization that they still have her burial and wake to go to. “We-”

“We’re not going. The rest of the family can deal with things for now. What’s important is getting you someplace you feel safe and finding out where Nick is,” Jake interjects. He has his serious lawyer face on. The one that is basically his stern big brother face but with more steel in his gaze.

For what feels like the millionth time Troy finds himself nodding his agreement before being led to his brother's truck. He spares his own a glance, and Jake tells him he’ll call someone to come and get it later. 

The movement of the truck as they start to drive, along with the general hum of the engine, lulls Troy into a daze. He’s so tired, so messed up from what he’s been through that he only barely followed along with Jake's conversation with Madison as her voice blasts through the speakers of the truck's Bluetooth connection.

She hasn’t seen or heard from Nick, but she has a GPS tracker in the car she can have turned on if she can’t get a hold of him. The conversation ends with Madison promising to call Jake when she knows Nick is okay.

It’s not until they’re about 10 minutes from home that they get the call they’ve been waiting for. Nick was with Gloria. Their friend Calvin found them and called the police just as Madison arrived. Nick overdosed and they’re taking him to the hospital right now.

Travis was the one that called. And he has to go before they can get any details out of him aside from what hospital he’s going to and that they can come wait with them, but Madison is furious and they might want to wait at home until they know what they’re dealing with when it comes to Nick’s condition.

When the call ends Jake pulls over and turns to Troy, who is just sitting quietly with his hands tightly gripping his suit jacket where it’s balled up in his lap. “Troy, what do you want to do?” he asks carefully.

Troy feels numb in a way that he normally would hate, but right now he welcomes it because being any other way would just be too exhausting. He swallows around the lump in his throat and looks at Jake briefly before looking back to the road. “Hospital,” is all he can force himself to say.

He misses the look of worry Jake gives him before pulling back onto the road and heading for the hospital. It’s going to be a long evening.

**Author's Note:**

> Yeah, I went there. Troy never meant to hurt Nick and Nick never meant to end up with Cal and Glo but he was really hurt and didn't know what he was doing.
> 
> Don't forget to check out the [Here's To Hating High School Together Playlist](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/1fXl9HXXalDwxgjQFnKOSm?si=PB1zuSsYRn2xs7JnSkPirw)
> 
> You can follow me on [ Twitter](https://twitter.com/TrickyHannigram) for more fandom related fun!
> 
> Or you can also follow me on [ Twitch](https://www.twitch.tv/enbystiles) for weekly writing and gaming streams.


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